LOCAL ELECTIONS : New Districts Make Primary Contests More Competitive

In Tuesday’s primary election, voters will find new districts and new faces, and some of the better-known old faces won’t be there--all the result of a once-a-decade reshuffling of California’s political deck.

Court-ordered reapportionment, plus an outbreak of anti-incumbent fever, has sent some longtime officeholders slouching toward retirement; others have been forced to move their base of operations--and in some case even their residences--to nearby districts to enhance their reelection prospects.

In the San Fernando Valley area, six of the 18 congressional, state Senate and Assembly seats have no incumbent. And every incumbent has lost at least a portion of his or her old district, and with it the high visibility that usually makes an officeholder invincible.

Further, the special panel of judges who realigned California’s political districts did so with no apparent regard for protecting the turf of influential leaders, forcing some powerful politicians to scramble to survive.

The result of all the changes: the most competitive election in years.

Congress

Assemblyman Tom McClintock (R-Thousand Oaks) is seeking to take his tax-cutting crusade to Congress in the new 24th District, but in the Republican primary several well-financed candidates are trying to block his attempt at political self-advancement.

Chief among the rivals are fellow conservative Sang R. Korman, a Korean-American businessman who has put more than $330,000 of his own money into the race, and Jim Salomon, a Westside trade consultant and moderate Republican who moved to Calabasas to run in this district.

Both Korman and Salomon have run for office before, and both lost despite outspending their opponents.

The district includes the south Valley, Las Virgenes area, Malibu, Thousand Oaks and Westlake Village.

While McClintock has stressed his labors on behalf of conservatism in Sacramento, Korman and Salomon are spending generously to depict McClintock as a professional politician, hoping he will be drowned by the anti-incumbent undertow.

Several other GOP candidates also are spending enough to have an effect on the race, including Nicholas T. Hariton, a Sherman Oaks attorney; Rob Meyer, also a Sherman Oaks attorney, and Bill Spillane, a former airline pilot from Thousand Oaks.

Other Republicans are Robert Colaco, a Van Nuys businessman; Harry Wachtel, a West Hills attorney, and Stephen M. Weiss, a Calabasas attorney and business consultant.

The victor will tee off against Rep. Anthony C. Beilenson of Los Angeles, a longtime liberal Democrat who is unopposed for renomination.

In the new 25th District, a conservative stronghold stretching from Northridge to the Mojave Desert in which no incumbent is running, the Republican nomination has set off a donnybrook.

Best known among the candidates are Assemblyman Phillip Wyman of Lancaster and Howard (Buck) McKeon, a former Santa Clarita city councilman and businessman.

Seeking to avoid anti-incumbent fever, both have played down their government service.

But a flock of rivals is determined not to let voters forget.

Chief among them are former Rep. John H. Rousselot, a onetime John Birch Society official trying to make a political comeback, and John J. Lynch, former Los Angeles County assessor.

Also running for the GOP flag are Larry Logsdon, a Palmdale history teacher, and Tom McVarish, a Granada Hills cost estimator.

The candidates have debated over who is the most conservative, as befits a district where 52% of voters are Republican.

James H. Gilmartin, a Saugus attorney, is the lone Democrat on Tuesday’s ballot in the district.

Undaunted by the long record of triumph that Democratic Rep. Howard L. Berman has at the polls, two Republicans are seeking to run against him in the 26th District, which includes most of the East Valley.

Squaring off in Tuesday’s GOP primary are two ideological opposites--Gary Forsch of Sun Valley, a hardware store manager, and Bill Glass of Sherman Oaks, a certified public accountant.

The conservative Forsch favors capital punishment and opening the coastline to oil drilling, both of which Glass, a moderate, opposes.

Glass favors lowering Medicare benefits for the rich, abortion rights and public financing of campaigns--all opposed by Forsch.

In the solidly Republican 27th District, Rep. Carlos J. Moorhead, a Glendale congressman for two decades, is expected to glide to renomination despite opposition from three rivals.

They are Lionel Allen Jr. of Altadena, an executive and disabled veteran; Barry L. Hatch of Alhambra, a teacher, and Louis Morelli of Glendale, a tax reduction advocate.

Democrats seeking their party’s nomination for what should be an uphill fight in November are John Grula of Pasadena, a research scientist, and Doug Kahn of Altadena, a business owner.

In the reapportionment lottery, Rep. Henry A. Waxman came up a winner. The longtime Los Angeles Democratic liberal ended up in the 29th District, which appears to be safely Democratic.

The district stretches from Studio City across the Santa Monica Mountains to Los Feliz and Santa Monica.

Despite Waxman’s prodigious fund-raising abilities and high visibility, Scott M. Gaulke, a Studio City property manager, is seeking to wrest the Democratic nomination from him.

The lone Republican on the ballot is Mark A. Robbins, a Los Angeles attorney.

State Senate

Bucking the trend toward free-market politics is the 17th Senate District, in which state Sen. Don Rogers (R-Tehachapi) is unopposed in the primary and William E. Olenick is the lone Democratic candidate.

In the 19th Senate District, two longtime GOP legislators who never cared much for one another have carried their enmity into the race to succeed state Sen. Ed Davis (R-Santa Clarita), who is retiring after 12 years.

Former Assemblywoman Marian W. La Follette of Newbury Park, who retired two years ago, and Assemblywoman Cathie Wright of Simi Valley were less than cordial to one another during the decade they represented adjacent districts in the Assembly.

Although Fillmore City Councilman Roger Campbell is also seeking the GOP nod, most political experts say the race is between La Follette and Wright.

Ideologically, there is little to choose between the two. Both are staunch conservatives running in a staunchly conservative district that stretches from the northwest San Fernando Valley to Oxnard.

La Follette enjoys the endorsement of Davis, the former Los Angeles police chief who has been a popular officeholder in the area for more than a decade.

Wright, a political enemy of Davis, is allied with a faction of conservative Republicans headed by former Rep. Bobbi Fiedler of Northridge.

Wright has attacked La Follette, who retired from the Assembly in 1990 and moved to Orange County, as a political opportunist for moving back to the area to run as a Davis ally.

La Follette has sought to bloody Wright by accusing her of acting as if she was “above the law” when she intervened with a judge two years ago on behalf of her daughter, who was facing jail for 27 traffic tickets.

Wright denies that she acted improperly and says La Follette is trying to exploit a dead issue.

In the 20th Senate District, state Senate leader David A. Roberti is fighting for his political life in a fierce contest with Republican Carol Rowen, a Tarzana pension consultant who has built her campaign around attacks on Roberti’s opposition to abortion rights.

The seat became vacant when Alan Robbins resigned and pleaded guilty to federal corruption charges and was sentenced to five years in prison.

Roberti and Rowen were the top finishers among 10 candidates in the April 7 primary in the district. Tuesday’s winner will serve the last two years of Robbins’ four-year term.

Also running are Glenn Bailey, an Encino resident and Green Party candidate; Gary Kast, a Panorama City attorney running under the Peace and Freedom banner, and John Vernon, a Libertarian and Van Nuys businessman.

Roberti chose to run in a district where he is less well-known than his current Hollywood-based district, which was eliminated in court-ordered reapportionment in January.

Rowen said she is stressing Roberti’s opposition to abortion rights because the U.S. Supreme Court could soon permit states to impose greater restrictions on abortions, throwing the issue into the Legislature.

Roberti, a liberal with legendary fund-raising abilities, also is under attack in the campaign by anti-tax groups for his support of a series of tax increases and by the National Rifle Assn., which is seeking to settle an old political score with Roberti for his sponsorship of a landmark 1989 ban on military-style assault weapons.

Rowen said she supports the assault gun ban and did not solicit support from gun owners.

Sen. Herschel Rosenthal also is fighting for political survival in a red-hot Democratic primary in the newly drawn 23rd Senate District, a solidly Democratic area that includes the south San Fernando Valley, the Las Virgenes area and a big chunk of the Westside.

Rosenthal’s challengers are Assemblyman Tom Hayden, who was stripped of his safe Santa Monica-based seat by reapportionment, and Pacific Palisades public relations consultant Catherine O’Neill, who all but dropped out of politics after narrowly losing a bid to become the first woman elected to the state Senate 20 years ago.

All three are liberal, yet they have stressed law-and-order issues since the Los Angeles riots. Hayden, long a liberal crusader, is the only one of the three who supports the death penalty.

Rosenthal, long backed by the mainline Westside political organization, has stressed his record of toil on behalf of liberal causes.

Hayden, backed by his cadre of Santa Monica activists, is running as an outsider despite his decade in the Assembly.

O’Neill, backed by women’s political organizations, has stressed her support for women’s issues and sought to portray herself as the only non-incumbent in the race.

State Assembly

There is no incumbent in the 36th District, so Hunt Braly, longtime chief of staff for Sen. Ed Davis, has served as the next best thing.

Braly, who leads the pack in fund raising, has been the target of constant fire from his seven Republican rivals who have sought to portray him as an incumbent in all but name.

Seeking to outdistance him in this conservative district, which includes the Santa Clarita and Antelope valleys, are William J. (Pete) Knight, a former Palmdale mayor, and Forrest L. McElroy of Palmdale, superintendent of the Palmdale Elementary School District.

Also in the GOP race are Kurt C. Boese of Canyon Country, a senior procurement representative; John C. Drew of Newhall, a college instructor; Keith Davis of Palmdale, a retired probation officer; Richard Irmer of Lancaster, an aerospace worker, and Sandra F. Tulley of Lancaster, an airline mechanic.

Arnie Rodio, a Lancaster City Council member, is unopposed for the Democratic nomination.

The heavily Republican 38th District would seem to be secure for Rep. Paula L. Boland of Northridge, who is unopposed for renomination, but two Democrats are fighting for the chance to oppose her in November.

The contestants are James Blatt of Northridge, a criminal defense attorney who terms himself a conservative Democrat, and Howard Cohen, an unemployed public affairs consultant.

Cohen has attacked Blatt for his defense of high-profile defendants, but Blatt, a former prosecutor, said he should not be penalized for his success as an attorney.

The strong favorite in the newly revamped 40th District is freshman Assemblywoman Barbara Friedman (D-Los Angeles), who moved into the district after her Hollywood-based district was vaporized by reapportionment. The retirement of longtime Democratic Rep. Tom Bane opened up the district.

Friedman, allied with the powerful Waxman-Berman political machine, is far ahead of her Democratic rivals in fund raising. Others seeking the Democratic nod are Jim Aldrich of Reseda, a research analyst; Dan Coen of North Hollywood, a community relations director, and Joel Bernard Kelman of North Hollywood, an attorney.

Although Democrats outnumber Republicans 54% to 35% in this south Valley district, three candidates are seeking the GOP nod--Horace H. Heidt of Sherman Oaks, a businessman; Jon Robert Lorenzen of Reseda, a mortician, and Brian Perry of Canoga Park, a business administrator.

The realigned 41st District remains predominantly Democratic, but it’s close enough to make Republicans think this is one they could win in November by defeating Rep. Terry B. Friedman, who is unopposed as the Democratic standard bearer.

The district straddles the Santa Monica Mountains, stretching from Santa Monica to Westlake Village and Tarzana. The apparent front-running GOP candidate is a moderate, Christine E. Reed, a former Santa Monica city councilwoman and a board member of the Metropolitan Water District.

Her more conservative rivals for the GOP nomination are Fred Beteta of Santa Monica, a retired engineer; accounting professor Paul Foote of Agoura Hills; Scott Meehan, a Malibu attorney, and businessman Stefan (Stu) Stitch of Malibu.

Outwardly, there is little to suggest that Assemblyman Burt Margolin (D-Los Angeles) could be denied renomination in the reapportioned 42nd District, which stretches from Sherman Oaks to Universal City, and across the Santa Monica Mountains to West Los Angeles.

But John J. Duran, a West Hollywood attorney and gay rights activist, has raised a respectable war chest to try to wrest the nomination from Margolin, a liberal in a liberal district who has championed gay rights legislation in Sacramento.

Seeking the Republican nomination are Robert K. Davis, a West Hollywood contractor, and Chauncey Medberry, a Los Angeles businessman.

In the 43rd District, Assemblyman Pat Nolan (R-Glendale) is unopposed for reelection, and the lone Democratic candidate is Elliott Graham of Glendale, a producer and director.

Without a Republican incumbent to keep them in check, 10 GOP candidates in the newly drawn 44th District have jumped at the chance to go to Sacramento.

This Pasadena-based district, in which the Republican candidate is likely to be heavily favored in November, stretches around the Verdugo Hills to include portions of the northeast Valley.

Chief among the conservatives in what has become an ideological dogfight are Pasadena insurance broker Bill Hoge, a political newcomer who has been endorsed by Nolan and Assemblyman Richard L. Mountjoy (R-Arcadia), and Lee David Prentiss, a Los Angeles Police Department detective supervisor and former South Pasadena City Council member.

Leading moderate candidates are Barbara Pieper, a former La Canada Flintridge City Council member who has been endorsed by Gov. Pete Wilson; Stephen Acker, a lawyer and former Pasadena city director, and Wilbert L. Smith, a bank executive and Pasadena school board member.

Also in the hunt are Roy Begley, a Pasadena writer; Bob Bell, a La Crescenta computer consultant; Maurine Petteruto of Temple City; T. H. Choi, a Pasadena businessman, and Robert Oltman, a Pasadena businessman.

Democratic candidates are Jonathan S. Fuhrman, a Pasadena business manager; John Vollbrecht, a Los Angeles businessman, and Daniel I. Hurst, a Pasadena computer consultant.